The Ebola quarantines and the great military divide
Cross Posted from the paying-home.
I generally try to avoid any topic about the president, because damn near everyone out there either hates the man reflexively, or sort of worships him. And so the comments turn into a disaster, and I have to keep monitoring, because some people simply cannot confine their comments to the issue at hand.
Today I am breaking that normal tradition because of all the answers to questions I’ve seen over the years, the president’s answer to an Ebola question the other day unquestionably strikes me as his worst. Some can argue the validity (politically or actually) of the “you didn’t build that” or the “you can keep your doctor” but for just straight up oddity, I give you the quote below.
But before we get to the quote, as a sort of framing of this, the backdrop is twofold. First, states are trying to quarantine doctors who treated Ebola patients. Some knucklehead decided that after treating victims in Africa, he’d just lie to the authorities:
The city’s first Ebola patient initially lied to authorities about his travels around the city following his return from treating disease victims in Africa, law-enforcement sources said.
Dr. Craig Spencer at first told officials that he isolated himself in his Harlem apartment — and didn’t admit he rode the subways, dined out and went bowling until cops looked at his MetroCard the sources said.
I literally have no position whatsoever on quarantines. I don’t know if they are needed, constitutional, fascist or ridiculous. I’m also not going to research it, because I suspect this topc de jure will be gone by the time I get back from my upcoming vacation. But, I also think that this guy, and the lady doctor in Maine (my home state) are being pretty selfish. You want me to be held aside, alone for 21 days? You’ll bring me food, I’ll have cable TV, and I can sleep as much as I want? Dude, sign me up.
Second, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel has decided to quarantine the troops when they get back from West Africa:
A 21-day quarantine for all military personnel serving in Ebola stricken areas of West Africa was approved by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel Wednesday.
The quarantine was pushed for by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Hagel said. Initially the measure will apply to all personnel leaving the West Africa area. But Hagel said the policy will be reviewed within 45 days.
The policy creates a separate set of rules for military members than what the White House has pushed for civilian health care workers. President Obama has argued that civilian volunteer health workers returning from aid trips to Africa should not be quarantined and the White House has urged states not to impose their own quarantine policies. Science, Obama has said, does not support the need for a quarantines.
So there’s the meat and potatoes (an extra “e” for Dan Quayle) of it. Now the quote:
Q Are you concerned, sir, that there might be some confusion between the quarantine rules used by the military and used by health care workers and by some states?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the military is a different situation, obviously, because they are, first of all, not treating patients. Second of all, they are not there voluntarily, it’s part of their mission that’s been assigned to them by their commanders and ultimately by me, the Commander-in-Chief. So we don’t expect to have similar rules for our military as we do for civilians. They are already, by definition, if they’re in the military, under more circumscribed conditions.
When we have volunteers who are taking time out from their families, from their loved ones and so forth, to go over there because they have a very particular expertise to tackle a very difficult job, we want to make sure that when they come back that we are prudent, that we are making sure that they are not at risk themselves or at risk of spreading the disease, but we don’t want to do things that aren’t based on science and best practices. Because if we do, then we’re just putting another barrier on somebody who’s already doing really important work on our behalf. And that’s not something that I think any of us should want to see happen.
There is so much in there it would take me a generation or two to unpack it all. The first sentence alone makes no sense logically. So the troops will not be treating patients, but they are going to be subject to more rigid restraints? That’s like saying a motorcycle is more dangerous than a Big Wheel, which is why you should always wear a helmet while riding a Big Wheel. Huh?
The rest of the paragraph makes more sense I suppose. When you do join, you understand you have fewer rights. That much is obvious to anyone that has joined. But from a public health standpoint, it isn’t even the slightest bit relevant. If this whole policy deals with the threat of Ebola to every day Americans, how does the circumscribed nature of military service add to the discussion? Huh?
The first sentence of the second paragraph is so long I get lost reading it. Presumably it is referring to the health people (nurses and doctors) volunteering overseas. But again, how is this different than the people in the military? Military people (believe it or not) ALSO have families, also have loved ones, also have difficult jobs, and we should decide for them based on “science and best practices” as opposed to the random selection by a magic 8-ball or a gorilla who can also pick Super Bowl winners. Again, it doesn’t really differentiate which is what the question was about. So again, huh?
The penultimate sentence though is the one that really (judging by my emails) has people angered. Again the specific question dealt with the differing ways we are dealing with civilians and military. So this sentence, “somebody who’s already doing really important work on our behalf” directed ONLY at the doctors, to differentiate them from service-members seems at first blush to be a complete insult. It’s really hard to interpret that sentence differently when given the context of the question.
I don’t know, maybe they were just free-wheeling an answer on the spot, and it was less that articulate. Lord knows I’ve said some dumb things in responses to questions. (Just ask my wife.) But this whole thing just seems insulting to me, and I don’t have a position on quarantines in general. But to differentiate between doctors who in their benevolence are dealing specifically with Ebola victims, from service-members who put their lives on the line, and then somehow create a policy that weighs safety with the value of the service, and deciding it favors doctors doesn’t make sense to me.
What do you guys think?
Category: Politics
Agree 100%. The quarantine should have been a condition from the beginning.
Yep.
And Obummer is a fool.
I read here that Woodrow Wilson did something similar during the Spanish Flu epidemic, and one Dwight David Eisenhower was left to enforce quarantine and save the bulk of his troops.
That was something I had not known before, and it explained to me why he became so beloved by my parents and grandparents.
They knew they could trust his judgment. By the time he was a candidate for the presidency, he had handled one horrible assignment after another.
Be glad the military is doing the cautious and intelligent thing. Be sure to hold them to it.
I am going to follow your lead, and not discuss what I know from reading the scientific literature on this subject. There are others who have written here in clear, factual terms.
I will say that I resent the various statements in the media characterizing the outpouring of public anger over the recent statements by the White House, the President, the head of the CDC and one ignorant nurse as “panic.” There is a large number of people with experience in the areas of infectious diseases and HIV in particular. They know very well the differences between HIV and Ebola. The anger was not directly from fear, but at being told consequential lies about this disease, coupled with failure to take reasonable precautions to prevent its spread to the United States.
Medical workers, educators, and journalists are so much better because their hearts are pure; GIs only want to kill someone. Or something. But notice it’s always the GIs that are called to rescue the pure of heart when pure heart clouds clear thinking and the fit hits the shan.
Those nasty ol’ soldiers are lower quality people who don’t have good immune systems and go sticking their wangs in whatever they can when they’re not shooting or knifing people… eww, quarantine those evil heathens (but let those saintly liberal medical people and the odd Liberian who’d NEVER lie to authorities just run loose breathing on and doing whatever with people ’cause they’re okay).
You talk o’ better food for us, an’ schools, an’ fires, an’ all:
We’ll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don’t mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow’s Uniform is not the soldier-man’s disgrace.
For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Chuck him out, the brute!”
But it’s “Saviour of ‘is country” when the guns begin to shoot;
An’ it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ anything you please;
An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool — you bet that Tommy sees!
Rudyard Kipling
No surprises here, dude.
I am less convinced that it is a deliberate insult, as much as it is a window into his soul and how he truly sees things. Ie, it’s just another indication that he has no regard for the US military, at all.
Finally, memo to POTUS:
Virii don’t care if you are military, civilian, black, white, rich, or poor. They infect all with gay abandon. If that link, that Lobo posted over at B5, to an article by Richard Preston noting that the data suggest that a Viral Load of ONE can result in the disease is accurate, common sense and prudence prompt us to err on the side of caution, wrt “to quarantine, or not to quarantine.”
How could a possible Viral Load of one, 70% fatality rate, and a propensity to mutate rate anything less?
It could, provided we had proven, effective vaccines plus herd immunity, and maybe not even then.
What I don’t understand is if they are not interacting with patients why did they activate medical units instead of engineers to build the clinics?
Um, next question, please. And this is a big part of the problem with the emperor. You have to parse damn near everything he says and can trust nothing out of his yap. Technically, if personnel in one of the mobile labs are handling and testing patient blood, sputum, what have you, they are not interacting with patients. And those troops that are interacting with any West African, are interacting not with patients but with potential future patients.
TSO: You don’t have a position on quarantine? I see elective office in your future. Okay. I’ll have to accept that but when a scenario is personalized, folks who don’t have a position on something often suddenly find that they do. Try it. I’ll bet you find a position.
Because medical units know how to erect their own field hospitals? Plus, there ARE engineering units. NMCB 133 is in theater right now.
Whenever I read anything like this, I always think “NO DOGS OR SOLDIERS ALLOWED.”
And yes, I know that sign was never really used in WWII. But that doesn’t make it any less true now than it was then. /sarc
The other mental image I get about the ebola issue is the picture of two broken water pipes in your house. If you only repair one pipe, how can you complain about the resulting water damage that the unrepaired pipe causes?
We should either enforce a quarantine, or simply gear up to treat infections as they arise, and stop this ninny-nannying around.
That one may not have been an urban legend, Pinto Nag. But the similar “Dogs and Sailors keep off the grass” signs in Norfolk and elsewhere before (and allegedly during and after World War II as well) appear to have actually existed.
http://www.defense.gov/specials/heroes/gordon.html
His inability to see (feel?) the sacrifice of the citizen/soldier is endemic to this administration. Discussing that aspect is a waste of electrons and will needlessly increase my carbon footprint.
On the other hand, the fact that the doctor initially lied is EXACTLY the reason we need to impose mandatory quarantines on ALL people returning from the affected areas. It is human nature to be able to lie, especially if we can rationalize (even erroneously) that it is in our best self-interest. That doctor knew he screwed up the same as a dog knows when it shits on the carpet.
Thank God for governors, our Republic, and states’ rights!
“That doctor knew he screwed up the same as a dog knows when it shits on the carpet.”
Yes, and the doctor, like the dog, doesn’t much care–until he gets caught. Good comment. Loved that closing of yours.
Not to give Obama a pass, because he doesn’t deserve one, but I think the last part is the thought that medical professionals will quit volunteering on such missions if they are held to strict quarantine when they get back, as opposed to military members who have no choice in their assignments.
But really, the whole thing may be the most stupid thing he’s ever said.
As for the nurse (not doctor) quarantined in Maine and making a big stink, she has no one to blame but the doctors that came before her and chose to ignore safety precautions and gallivant about the city and then lie about it. Also, she is not just some hero nurse protecting her rights, she has ties to the CDC and is an Obama activist. So is her agenda to support Obama’s no quarantine as opposed to state governor’s quarantine? Or is her agenda to get a nice payday out of a lawsuit/book/movie? Or both?
A real medical professional would be concerned for those around him/her and voluntarily submit to self-quarantine at home.
What a cluster.
Yeah, I’ve read and heard that: If they are quarantined, they will quit volunteering. So, let them quit! First, if three weeks at home is going to prompt them to quit, then they can face the ridicule they will justifiably receive. Second, since these volunteers are, with one exception, the ones carrying the contagion back to the US, I could get behind a quarantine for that reason alone.
“On the other hand, the fact that the doctor initially lied is EXACTLY the reason we need to impose mandatory quarantines on ALL people returning from the affected areas.”
Precisely! To this point, the selfless medical servants and patients involved haven’t proved to be selfless at all. On the contrary, they have engaged in high risk activities that even a lay person can see as irresponsible.
I worked in the health care industry for thirty years and can assure you that it is not heavily populated with people of low self esteem. On the contrary there is a tendency, based on their special knowledge and skills, to be dismissive towards the rest of us, and that superior attitude includes nurses.
Couple that attitude with a sense of self-righteousness sometimes seen in those who “sacrifice” to serve the needy and you can find yourself dealing with some real prima donnas who believe the rules are for everyone else.
The nurse in Maine appears to exemplify this.
Word.
X2
Yep. Medical personnel often act as if they’re demigods if not full deities; want everyone to know that; and want everyone to treat them accordingly. In reality, their sh!t stinks just the same as anyone else’s.
Allow me to paraphrase Obama’s message, as I understand his message:
Our doctors and nurses are heroic in their willingness to travel across the Atlantic to try to stop the spread of Ebola and to treat those afflicted by it. They have volunteered themselves, their time, and their talents to win this fight. They are all well educated and I have yet to meet or hear about one who isn’t a liberal. The very least we can do is treat them for what they are, heroes in the truest sense of the word. Some nasty hardasses are demanding that these heroes be quarantined, isolated from family and friends, kept from their vital work in treatment and research. This is not only wrong, it is terribly wrong. That is not way to treat heroes and I won’t do it.
And let’s not forget that there is another group of people involved in this fight: our military. They do what they are told to do. If I tell one of them to hold my umbrella, he holds my umbrella! If I salute them with a coffee cup in my hand, so what? I am their Commander in Chief. They can’t say shit. If I choose to release five of their battlefield enemies, they have to deal with it. Unlike our medical heroes, many of our military have only a GED or high school diploma and far too many end up voting for conservatives. They are accustomed to hardship and being treated like crap. So, let’s not forget them, anyway.
If that is not LITERALLY true, it certainly reflects the actions of the administration.
If our President does not completely agree with what you wrote then his actions are in complete conflict with his opinions.
Or to further paraphrase: The military – oh, we can fuck with them so we will. They just have to suck it up.
As someone who works in PR, I have to admit to being baffled at the logic and messaging POTUS and Earnest are using here.
On the one hand- they’re clearly identifying with and playing to their base. But- to a significant segment of the general public (at least those who are paying attention- which may not be all that many these days)- this comes off as pretty tone deaf.
I saw it somewhere today, but Kaci Hickox’s arrogance may be creating a public backlash to counter the sentiment of heroics associated with volunteer caregivers. With the general election just days away, I guess I don’t understand the administration’s response here.
Just one more example of the continued incompetence that we’re seeing on so many levels these days.
Coming late this morning but TSO and all of you who commented above covered my thoughts exactly. Nothing to add except rant and I’ll pass on it right now since I’m having a pretty even, laid back day.
I do thank all of you for you comments and insight.
There is indeed a difference between the military and the civilians in this instance as well a most others.
In this instance you have thousands of service members performing their mission as promised and then continuing to perform their mission as they are quarantined as a safety precaution. No whining to the media, just another day doing what they promised which is to perform the mission as ordered. Thank you very much.
The civilians involved have lied, have sought the advice of attorneys, and have generally been involved in some irresponsible behavior regarding their potential for contaminating supposed friends and loved ones.
If you came to visit me less than three weeks after treating viral hemorrhagic fever, you’d most likely not be allowed entry and our friendship or family relations would be pretty much at a standstill for the rest of your life.
In conclusion; lying, arrogant, irresponsible civilians on one hand and mission focused, honoring their contract service members on the other. There is nothing really new in any of that sadly. One need only take a quick look at this site and look at what passes for culture these days to realize the depth of the disconnect that a great majority of civilians have with their fellow citizens who are veterans.
The fact our president can’t differentiate the reality of that situation should come as no surprise as we are dealing with a man who authored less than a dozen pieces of legislation on his own and who never commanded anything other than his own day to day existence prior to arriving at 1600 PA Ave.
Well, I don’t ‘hate’ bodaprez. I merely regard him as what he is: an incompetent slacker asshole who got lucky, and now embodies the Peter Principle. He is, in fact, the poster child for that label. He’s not worth the energy that it takes to generate hatred. That members of his own party don’t even want him around speaks volumes about him. They finally woke up and smelled the spilled coffee. In regard to Nurse Diesel Ratshit Kaci Hickox, she broke home quarantine and went for a bike ride with her boyfriend. Quarantine is for public safety. It isn’t punishment. She epitomizes her spoiled brat generation. (They aren’t ALL like her, fortunately.) http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/10/30/us-health-ebola-usa-idUKKBN0II1SP20141030 In regard to the jumbled gobbledygook quoted above in TSO’s post, my response is that this is the ‘do something’ coming out as ‘say something’. Unfortunately, it does require massive editing to make sense, but the gist of it is that bodaprez likes theses volunteers, because he thinks they represent votes and is willing to pander to them. On the other hand, he not only does not see military service as voluntary, but rather as a penalty for its mere existence, a toy that he can play with when it’s raining and he can’t play golf. His contempt for the military has always been patently visible. And I think he’s maybe a little afraid of them. He may have seen a gleam in someone’s eyes when he visited a base and didn’t get the bodacious applause he thinks he should get just for being him. In addition, because he’s a slacker and a dilettante, he has no sense of value or loyalty to anyone or anything. He runs away from the White House whenever he can and complains about the job and its restrictions on him, so you know I’m not making that up. He’s treated the most important job in this country like it doesn’t matter as long as he gets the applause for just being there. I don’t think that dipstick has a clue about anything, nor do I think he cares about anything other… Read more »
EBOLA!!!
Most people when speaking publicly on contentious or emotional topics should very much avoid going off-script. I thought that this was “Presidential speaking 101”.
From personal experience, I know how very much I tend to annoy people with snap comments. What seems like humor to me, falls flat for others. Geek. I got used to it a long time ago. But I do not run for office.
Contrasting “off the cuff” moments of Reagan and Obama can be instructive.
All these same chuckleheads were losing their shit over the bird flu and SARS, which has turned out to be far less lethal than Ebola, but they don’t give a rip about it now.
“In a separate interview with the Maine Sunday Telegram newspaper, Hickox told how she spent her last night in Sierra Leone trying to save the life of a young girl suffering from Ebola. ‘“I don’t remember her exact age. I think she was 10, but to watch a 10-year-old die alone, in a tent and know there wasn’t anything you could do … it’s hard,”’ she told the newspaper.” Source: NBC News
Okay, just from what very little I know about her (and that is more than enough, thanks) I’m running the BULLSHIT flag up the pole on that. Before I believe that she tried to save the life of anone, let alone a child in a tent the very night before she left Sierra Leone, I want at least three affidavits—notarized—that attest to that claim. Otherwise, I think she just made it up. What do we call it, Stolen Valium?
She evidently really believes herself to be extra special.
That story is exactly why many of us think she should be in isolation – she admits that she was exposed to someone when they were most likely to transmit the disease. Just before she traveled.
Or she’s lying. Either way, the rest of us don’t need to be around whatever it is that she has.
I can’t recall whether I predicted this in a comment in one of the TAH Ebola threads or just wondered to myself when it would happen. Anyway, it has happened. In Maryland. information about Ebola and its possible spread in the US is being stifled, by the state. And you can be sure that it is or will be coming to your location sooner than later. According to a story in this morning’s Baltimore Sun, “Under a state health department policy released Wednesday, state and hospital officials will no longer release details or confirm whether anyone is isolated because of Ebola suspicions unless a case is confirmed.” So, relax, the government has this.
It’s called the “mushroom principle”, 2/17 Air Cav. I trust I don’t have to explain that in detail.
Repressive governments use it as a tactic in population control.